March 27 (Bloomberg) -- The U.K. proposed changes to its
Carbon Reduction Commitment tax on emissions that the Department
of Energy and Climate Change said will save businesses and
public agencies 330 million pounds ($527 million) by 2030.

The government suggested reducing the number of fuels
covered by the program to four from 29, cutting the amount of
reporting required by businesses, and slashing the amount of
time they’ll have to maintain records, the department said today
in an e-mailed statement. The proposals are subject to a
consultation that ends on June 18.

The Carbon Reduction Commitment has twice been delayed and
has been criticized by businesses for its complexity. The
program covers 5,000 organizations from big retailers such as
Tesco Plc to universities and government bodies, and the
Treasury estimates it will raise 3.5 billion pounds in fees in
the four years through April 2015.

“We have listened to businesses’ concerns about the CRC
and have set out proposals to radically cut down on red tape to
save businesses money,” Secretary of State for Energy and
Climate Change Ed Davey said in today’s statement.

In 2010, the government changed the CRC to a tax from a
program that redistributed payments among participants according
to their performance in cutting emissions. Last week, Chancellor
of the Exchequer George Osborne said he may replace it with a
different green tax in the fall if the government is unable to
simplify it.

The changes the government is suggesting today are “far
from the bonfire of administration heralded in last week’s
budget,” David Symons, a director at the consultancy WSP
Environment & Energy, said in an e-mailed statement. “Instead of
tinkering with CRC rules and heralding these as significant
changes, the Government would do better to really focus on how
it can help and encourage businesses to reduce their energy
bills.”